Back in my office, I was talking to Marty about the legislation we would be bringing out. The plan was that once we were all sworn in again, and the House was back in session, we would keep the pressure up by introducing a new bill every day. I had the two bills that I was going to introduce. In both cases I was going to make sure I had a little speech prepared. While it would be too much to hope that the TV news would pick up even one for a soundbite, the odds were that they would focus on what we were doing with the Contract.
"What do you think Clinton's going to do about them?", asked Marty.
I shrugged. "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee ... He's going to bob and weave for a bit, and then try to bury them or whatever. Some he'll sign, after trying to highjack them. Others he is just going to veto, and hope he can get away with it. Hell, some of them are going to end up at the Supreme Court!"
"You think?"
"For sure. The line item veto, for instance, that's a clear break in the rules for the legislative branch versus the executive branch. Likewise, at least one or two of the states will sue over D2A. That will be a states' rights issue."
"Too bad we don't have a lobbyist we could hire for these things.", he said with a laugh. "We could lobby for our own legislation."
Marty just tossed that off in passing, but as he did, it felt like lightning had just struck. I was quiet, and he was quiet, and we looked at each other in awe. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?", he asked me.
"You'd better tell me what you're thinking,", I said eagerly.
"I'm thinking why don't we set up our own lobbying outfit!"
"That's what I'm thinking, too!"
"Look, it's your money, but you don't seem to mind spending it. What if you funded a lobbying group?", he asked.
"Could I do that? Is it legal?"
"I don't know. Maybe. I can tell you this much, it would have to be buried deeper than a coal mine! Nobody, and I mean nobody, can know about this, or it destroys whatever chance you have of making it work! You can't be seen to be buying your own legislation. You'd become a laughingstock overnight!"
"Holy shit! Are you serious? We could do this?", I asked him. "How much would it cost?"
Marty gave me an incredulous look and raised his hands palm up. "No fucking idea. Could you raise the money without anybody catching on?"
"I think so."
"Un-fucking-real! Let me look into this..."
"Quietly!", I interjected.
Marty nodded. " ... and I'll talk to you about it."
That night I called John Steiner and asked to meet him quietly at the office in Hereford the next day. That morning I drove in to the office and said hello to everybody, and then John and I went into his office and lowered the Cone of Silence. "What's up?", he asked.
"I need to set up some untraceable cash, probably a few million. Nothing about it can point at me. How do we do that?"
My friend gave me a strange look. "Excuse me? What are you up to now?"
"I was talking to Marty about something, and we want to try something, and to do it we are going to need some laundered money. Can we do it?"
"What are you up to now!? I will not be a party to anything illegal!"
I had to laugh at John. "Well, we don't think it's illegal, but it's probably smelly as all hell. Basically, we came up with the idea of forming our own lobbying group. I mean, I write a piece of legislation and the first thing that happens is all the lobbyists in town try to water it down and get a piece of the action. So, let's become our own lobbyists and fight for it! Fight fire with fire! The only way to do it, though, is by making our lobbying group a secret, so that nobody can claim I'm buying legislation."
"Which is what you're actually doing."
"Exactly!"
"I should report you to the RNC!", he protested.
"Lawyer-client privilege.", I chided.
John made a very rude gesture at me and snorted. I wasn't too worried. He would be much more likely to squawk if the problem was illegal rather than simply going against the national committee. "Okay, let me work on this. I'll let you know. Don't tell anybody other than your friend, though, because it really would smell."
I thanked him and left, and drove over to Westminster and flew down to D.C. to get some work done. A week later he summoned me and Marty to a meeting at his office. I had Marty go over to Washington National in the morning, where Tyrell was waiting for him. He flew to the house and dropped him off, and then we drove into Hereford. I showed Marty around the offices and then we went into John's office, where John was sitting with another man.
"Carl, Marty, This is Bob Seaver. Explain to him what you two have in mind.", started John.
I nodded and shook Seaver's outstretched hand. He was a sort of nondescript fellow, a few years older than me, more advanced baldness, a touch heavy around the middle, kind of bland looking. "It's good to meet you, Mr. Seaver."
"Congressman, nice to see you, too." He looked over at Marty, and said, "Same to you, Mr. Adrianopolis." They shook hands as well. We all sat down and Seaver continued at that point. "I understand you want to set up a lobbying effort in Washington, but that it needs to be totally laundered and unknown. Is that correct?"
"Pretty much.", I admitted. I glanced over at Marty, who nodded back.
"All right, so once the funds are in the lobbying group and you need them to be dispersed, you then want the funds from the lobbying group to be secretly funneled to various politicians or bureaucrats?"
At that point, I looked at Marty in confusion. "Is that what we wanted?"
He shook his head. "No, that would be illegal."
Seaver looked over at John and then back to us. "So you don't want the activities of the lobbying group to be hidden, only the source of their funding?"
"Right. I mean, at that point it's just one more lobbying or policy outfit. We just don't want to trace the money back to me."
He breathed a sigh of relief at that. "Oh, well, that's different! You're right, that's fine. Hiding what they do with the money, that would be illegal. That wouldn't be protected, either, since it would be a violation of the canons. Hiding the funding to start with, that's no problem. Do you have any of this started yet? Do you have a name?"
I blinked at that. "No. We just thought this up. We wanted to find out if we could get away with it first. So, we can do this?"
Seaver simply waved a hand dismissively. "Just say when."
"Huh." I turned to Marty. "Got a name?"
Marty shrugged, too. "Something innocuous and patriotic or whatever. They're all named American Something-or-other, Institute or Foundation or whatever. They all sound alike."
"The American Renaissance Initiative, building America's tomorrow, today!", I intoned solemnly. I remembered Stephen Colbert's Super-Pac, 'Building a better tomorrow, tomorrow!'
John chuckled and shook his head. Marty gave a wry grin, and commented, "Perfect. They all say that!"